A workshop being completed

[ernest dubois]

Hi,

This is about lighting and I post it up because the other general lighting information stuck up there seemed so far off-target in my case to spend the time reading completely.
Maybe the question can be framed as a choice of a couple broad options, I'm kind of testing both and looking for some ideas one way or the another, directed lighting or flood lighting.

Regards,

Ernest Dubois

[Bill Adamsen]

Lighting, like dust collection, seems to have it's zealots. The good news is that you should get lots of opinions on what to do.

My space has some similarities to yours. I spent a bit of time with test fixtures (temporarily hanging different fixtures at different heights) before making my final selection. I then calculated the amount of light I was supposed to need, to see if it validated what I was seeing with the temporary fixtures. I probably used the formulas provided in that article you reference. It also helped with selecting bulbs of the right color temperature and other attributes. I was happy that I did that research because several options - including recommended alternatives - were ruled out. The lighting as installed is close to perfect for me - and fortunately that's what counts. The fixtures are hung from the beams on very thin but strong stainless aircraft control cable. The electricity is run on top of the beams and is pretty invisible - while the outlets (yes each lamp has a plug) are on the bottom of the beam, making maintenance easy. The light is superb for working, the installation is clean and aesthetic.

There are lots of fixtures - like mine - that are mass produced to feed a substantial and growing (apparently) indoor plant industry. So large selection, better quality, great pricing, good advice, tested delivery logistics. Mine were 6 bulb T-5 HO with selectable switching (two bulbs or four) per fixture. I had just enough height (barely) to make them "high bay" - definitely enough height to get them "out of the way."

Good luck, looks like an intriguing space!

[Jamie Buxton]

To my eye, shop lighting is a choice between efficiency and color of light. Fluorescents are efficient, which is good. However, the light color is not like sunlight or halogen floods. Many people don't seem to notice the color difference, so fluorescents are good for them. Me, I use halogen floods.

[ernest dubois]

Funny, florescent light has always given me the creeps as well but I always dismissed it thinking I was the only one. What are these halogen floods you mention? If one looks up high in my picture the fixture might be seen, on the label is standing 2000 watt but that means nothing to me still, it sounds powerful and I'm willing to try.

Bill, it seems to me you rely on direct sources of light for particular spaces throughout your workplace rather than flooding the whole place with light. The space I have is developing more and more to my liking every day now I'm back to working there.

[Jamie Buxton]

... What are these halogen floods you mention? ...

http://www.amazon.com/17979-6-Outdoo...3070683&sr=1-6

[Todd Burch]

Ernst, are you in Canada or Europe? And, is that wattle I see, waiting for daub?

Bill - awesome shop. Awesome.

[Todd Burch]

Bill, I just showed my wife the picture of your shop. She said you are lying. She said it was Norm Abram's shop and you just stole the picture. She said no one has a shop that nice. Then she went on to point out how there was no clutter, and it was so clean, obviously implying that I don't subscribe to those tenants. Thanks a lot BILL!

[Jim Matthews]

I work out of a much smaller space, in a basement with casement windows
facing North and East. There's limited natural light available.

I use daylight balanced florescent lighting directly over my bench.
I also pinned up some reflective foil to keep what light I have bounced toward the floor.

Were I to deal with a shop so large as yours, I would investigate
some sort of light bounce above the lights, to keep reflected light in the space.

I would also have a good look at what is now available in LED lighting,
which can be very bright, well diffused and low power consumption.

http://ledlightingshop.co/led-light-fixture/

[ernest dubois]

Jim, that is precisely what I would call an example of directed lighting and for the workbench area, after a good exposure to the outside light, that is what I am going for. Out there in the larger machine area of the workshop I have less of an understanding of the good solution to make a call so I'm looking into it all at this point. All I know is the lighting I have now, as temporary as it is, can lead to frustrations often.

Todd, I'm out here in Europe, the Dutch part, Oostrum to be exact, have been these past 15 years now. It is a wattle fill in the framed panels for sure. I have dug the clay for daub and it sits out in the garden waiting for a good freeze, hopefully the coming winter, (will it ever freeze again?) before mixing and going up there.

[Keith Weber]

To my eye, shop lighting is a choice between efficiency and color of light. Fluorescents are efficient, which is good. However, the light color is not like sunlight or halogen floods. Many people don't seem to notice the color difference, so fluorescents are good for them. Me, I use halogen floods.

Jamie, you do know that fluorescent lights don't just come in one color, right? If you want to match daylight, or anything else, you just need to use a bulb with the appropriate K-value.

[Jamie Buxton]

Jamie, you do know that fluorescent lights don't just come in one color, right? If you want to match daylight, or anything else, you just need to use a bulb with the appropriate K-value.

Yes, fluorescents come in all sorts of colors. The specs include a range of CRI (color rendering index), and color temperature (K-value). When I set up my current shop, I wired it for fluorescents, and I tried every kind of bulb I could find. None of them looked as good as my old shop, which had halogen floods. So I gave up on fluorescents.

What we see, and what bulbs put out, is a broad spectrum of light. The color temperature is just the temperature at the peak of the emitted spectrum. You could have many different bulbs with different spectrum shapes, but the same color temperature. So the K-number isn't very useful, IMHO.

Color rendering index, right up front, is an admission that fluorescent bulbs aren't good. The lighting manufacturers present it as a measure of how close to sunlight the bulb's emitted spectrum is. Flip that definition around, and it is a measure of how far from sunlight the bulb is. If they have to have something like CRI, they're admitting that the bulbs are perceptably different from sunlight. On top of that, even high-CRI bulbs, to my eye, have colors that are quite different from sunlight, and are unpleasant.

My theory is that people have differing abilities to see color, just like we have differing abilities to hear. Two people can look at the same scene, and maybe what one perceives is different from what the other perceives. Some people may be okay with fluorescent colors, while I see it differently.

[Jim Andrew]

I have a few flood lights, they are kindof a cone type fixture along the wall, near the ceiling. My big concern about using halogen bulbs is the heat. My fixtures collect dust, and I don't like dust and heat together. I use daylight bulbs in my fluorescent lights, and they are much brighter than the old cool whites.

[glenn bradley]

Obviously there is an element of personal preference involved. I also here preferences developed due to previous environments or experiences. What is best for you is, like so many things, specific to you. I run a lot of light, it is fluorescent in source, 6500k in color temperature, 80-something in CRI and is brutally white and sterile looking. This works best for me in my working environment as it provides the best visibility for me when measuring, marking, fitting, etc. If I were 20 years younger I would probably like something else or more likely, not really care since my eyes would be functioning better .

I have an assortment of other lamps that I use when preparing or selecting finishes. If I am making something for someone's living room filled with a lot of natural light reinforced by incandescents, I use lamps in that color range for color selections. Anyone who has moved a piece from an incandescent environment to a "daylight" fluorescent environment and noticed the shift in color of the piece knows what I'm on about .

If you assume your shop environment will match anyone's room that your work may end up in, you're probably wrong most of the time. Depending on who you make things for, how you work with them to decide on the design and so forth, simulating their environment may not be realistic or even desirable. If you shop is to be a one-and-only work space, finishing room, finish 'finishing' space, I would make the lighting match whatever makes the space most enjoyable for you.

[ernest dubois]

… I would make the lighting match whatever makes the space most enjoyable for you.

Yes, that's what I'm trying to get at now.

[Bill Adamsen]

Bill, I just showed my wife the picture of your shop. She ... "went on to point out how there was no clutter, and it was so clean" ...

A truly unique set of circumstances that will likely never happen again, which is why I took the photo ... for better or worse, there is now evidence it "did happen!